Takes cup and fills with water from sink in the office while side-eying doctor

I no longer trust the doctors to have my best interests when I would have to live in fear of a false positive followed by a negative and potential accusation of intentional miscarriage. Glad I got my IUD put in 6 weeks postpartum before they ban that too. I can't expect much from a state with the 2nd highest maternal death rate in the nation. Year and a half to go before we can move. Try to give me a heads up before they go full handmaids tale and prevent any women from moving from the state...

The thing is, they do. Patient confidentially is taken extremely seriously, and you are afforded specific and strict privacy rights with a medical professional. It can only be breached when something warranting a “duty to warn” law arises, like a patient expressing serious intent to kill another person. Still, not all states have even adopted these breaches of confidentiality.

I’m thinking there will be different courses of action regarding privacy protections from doctors of a pro-life or pro-choice belief system. I wouldn’t be surprised to see many doctors reject this bill.

Yup, these waters are so muddied because one side is defining the fetus in terms of biological principles and philosophies surrounding valuable life, while another’s perspective is rigid in religious doctrine, concept of the soul, God’s will, etc.

I don’t see hope for a resolution. These are extreme differences in ideology and definitions of reality.

While conservative Christianity gets a lot of airtime and is wreaking havoc in the southeast, trust that there are a lot of liberal churches who are going to harbor women who want abortions and help them get them.

Yes, I understand that churches have done a lot of shitty things, And have pushed their beliefs on others., which is profoundly wrong .

Also it is good to know that some churches are organized forces for good.

If there's one group of people you can rely on to get underground abortions, it's the Catholic church. They've been helping raped nuns get secret abortions for years.... Oh, I forgot, they've also been raping nuns...

There is hope. I'm religious, and have been for my whole life. For years I was ardently "pro-life". Over time, I met people who had different views from my own. A couple close friends shared with me why they believed what they believed. They helped me change my mind.

Now I adamantly advocate for abortion rights and share my story when I can. There is hope, but it will be difficult. Not everyone is willing to listen, but it can be worth it to reach out and try to connect with the other side. You might just find an ally.

Imagine a person is in the hospital because they need a blood transfusion. If they don't get one, they will die. It would be very nice for someone to choose to give them some of their blood, but it's not ok to make someone donate blood if they don't want to. It would be nice for someone to give their blood, but it would be horrible for people to be forced to donate against their will.

Just because you would donate blood willingly doesn't mean it's ok to strap down another person and steal their blood to save another person's life.

Kinda think that's doing a disservice to non-religious folks who are against abortion; to some, life literally starts at conception and they believe abortion is unethical due to principles around non-interference (it would have lived if the doctor/mother didn't act to abort it).

Have a friend who is ardently atheist and pro-choice, but strictly believes abortion is murder and would never get one for herself. I'm more of a pro-abortion heathen ("Stop calling it a 'difficult choice' and a 'tragedy' because that's not every woman's story. And should you really have that baby right now?")

The vast majority are religious, an honestly, even the “non-religious” anti-choice individuals are influenced by religion, as there’s not a rational reason to be anti-choice. “Life begins at conception” is a religious argument, as if, logically, life began at conception, it would be a slippery slope to, well, laws like the ones we’re seeing in Georgia. If a woman does anything that has a chance of increasing miscarriage, is that negligence? If so, this starts to restrict pregnant women from doing petty much anything but lying in bed all day.

But that's slippery slope fallacy assuming that "life begins at conception" must necessarily result in the conclusion "we should ban abortion." I am ardently pro-choice, but I still believe life begins at conception. It's a cell/group of cells which undergoes metabolism and many other cellular processes which we see in other living organisms. It just isn't valuable life or "life which can undergo suffering", and I don't think saying "life begins at conception" and "abortion is not morally wrong" are in conflict. After all, I literally kill billions of bacteria every time I use soap and eat the carcasses of thousands of plants and hundreds of animals each year. And the embryo only implants like 50% of the time due to the mother-baby interactions around embryo selection. (For someone who subscribes to such a belief system, this means the most logical way to reduce "lost lives" would be to increase access contraceptives, another win in my book).

Simplifying the debate down to "does life begin at conception" is exactly what fundamentalists want because it is such a loaded question and it's a way to reify the voting population near a half-half split and harvest votes. Let's open the discussion and show our side has way, way more flexibility for belief systems.

What? Where's the religion in that statement? It's a line oft used by religious people, but it's not religious at all in its argument.

And you think it's without logic? Tell me, let's say a woman just gave birth. And some guy runs into the ER and kills the baby with a gun. Is that murder? Yes?

But if hours before, he did the same thing, only this time he kills the baby in the mother's womb, is it still murder? Yes or no? I would definitely argue it is.

So how about we go a few days back now? Is it still murder? What about a week? Still? When is it not murder for that guy to run in and kill that baby in the womb? Is it when the lungs have formed? Does there need to be a heartbeat?

Basically, you'll be chasing this imaginary line until you realize that it was alive since conception.

I'm not saying no one can get abortions, but it's obvious that it is snuffing out life.

I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to shoot a non-pregnant women in the abdomen, so I don’t think you need the presence of a fetus to stop the slippery slope of allowing someone to run in and shoot someone.

What if you thought about carrying a pregnancy as an action - using a woman’s own blood sweat and tears to create the conditions by which another human becomes. How generous it is for so many women (even half of those women who didn’t plan their pregnancies) to commit themselves so profoundly to someone they’ve never met!

That might focus you less on the women who choose to make their own bodies less hospitable to others and more on the conditions that make women willing to be mothers.

But if hours before, he did the same thing, only this time he kills the baby in the mother's womb, is it still murder? Yes or no? I would definitely argue it is.

Regardless of your argument, it actually is a murder charge - foeticide - in a lot of places. Different states/countries have different age limits, and it's a State crime in 38 US states, and a Federal crime in all states, depending on how the baby died. So many places have drawn that arbitrary line somewhere.

There's definitely a point where the developing cells suddenly are 'alive', but before then I like to think of it as 'potential life' - similar to the scientific concept of potential energy. It's there, it's tangible and measurable, but it isn't active yet.

Exactly, and the very second they engage with this bullshit patient confidentiality stops being a thing.

That means the last thing a pregnant woman should do is ask for any kind of medical attention in THAT state, even if she is determined to carry on with the child. Because sometimes bad things happen, and in the worst possible scenario nobody should have to ask herself: Is my doctor going to report me?

And that’s precisely the whole OP’s point. Medical professionals there are no longer trustworthy for any kind of sexual health issues, not because they are “bad” or “ruthless” (I genuinely believe most of them would choose to do the right thing), but because it would be silly to ask someone you don’t know to break the law to help you.

I could spend the whole day detailing the awful amount of issues not having a trustworthy sexual health system is going to have for the society as a whole. I’m just going to say: this is also going to kill males, since most sexual relationships involve both men and women and sexual health is not only about pregnancies.

It would require a major backlash from doctors, a widespread movement of resistance, maybe a strike. We would need palpable action that would mobilize the other states. All of this is difficult with a conservative Supreme Court, however. I don’t have faith that they wouldn’t overturn Roe v. Wade given the opportunity.

I think that God was a literal slang term for slave owner that slowly turned into our form of deity because of the whole caste system of Egypt and that the Moses guy shared his story a bunch but the story got fragmented and morphed too much and now he's famous for basically being an olde MLK and Jesus is basically olde MLK junior.

Move to another state or ideally another country. Easier said than done I know, but USA and especially southern shit hole states are extremely dangerous for women. Just look at our maternal death rates, violent crime rates, and life expectancies. USA is a declining nation and it doesn't look like it's going to get better.

What we (in the South) need is probably more Northerners moving here. North Carolina has had massive influx of Northerners (pretty sure 63% of the 1995 population of Buffalo NY now lives here), and NC is turning distinctly purple. Do we still have a ridiculous state legislature that is furiously disenfranchising people of color with all its might? Absolutely. But we have a Democratic governor and went for Obama in 2008, so there may be hope.

Very true. I fear we need to amass a greater majority in order to overcome the gerrymandering and get back to having an actual representative democracy. It's truly maddening to watch these power-drunk assholes.

Good point. Especially since the bar is pretty low, at least when it comes to convincing people to move out of the ultra expensive west coast. Thing is, even as a person in the south, I really don't know what to do to make this happen. :(

No wonder literally no one takes this sub seriously. If one only browsed this sub and /r/politics, you wouldn't think the United States is leading the world in medical innovation, research, and University. Also, the singular world superpower and zeitgeist.

Actually our education system sucks, tbh. This is coming from someone who is a year away from being a pharmacist. Our standards of who can enter medical programs is kind of scary. There are some of my classmates that I wouldn’t let fill an antibiotic, let alone try and recommend a product. And the person whose status you commented on is also correct in that we have horrendous mother/infant care in terms of delivery and recovery.

What about rabbit shit? I heard rabbits eat their babies sometimes. Should we put rabbits in jail? Actually that's a good idea. Rehabilitation and job training programs along with everyone getting a pet rabbit that they have to keep alive.

I’m not onboard with this law, but I’d like to point out that you would not have to prove you weren’t have to abort to avoid jail. The state is responsible for proving you WERE trying to abort. You are innocent until proven guilty, and this law doesn’t change that.

That said, the law does open up the very real possibility of an investigation being launched even in the case of an actual miscarriage, which is absolutely NOT what a woman needs at that point.

Also- While the law is reprehensible and grotesque, I think that the VAST majority of doctors- specifically OBGYN are on your side on this. That said- if the law makes you uncomfortable (it should) and moving is a solution that works... I do not blame you in the least.

and when they get to say 'i have patients who now refuse routine health exams because they fear being wrongfully accused of intentionally miscarrying' it adds weight to us saying 'this is the worst law ever written'

Even if I really liked my OB/GYN, trusted them, had known them for years... I think I'd go with OP's plan. It's not like you're personal friends with your doctor, and if they're professional then you wouldn't know their religious or political beliefs.

You wouldn't ever trust your doctor enough to admit you'd murdered someone (which is what this bill pretends you're doing). Maybe your husband, maybe your best friend, but probably not your doctor. Which is gonna be a really shitty situation for anyone who has a miscarriage or actually goes out of state for an abortion.

I mean, my first obgyn guilted me for having sex ‘so young and outside of marriage’ (i was 16), and was unnecessarily rough with me when using the speculum. I was there for birth control and pain with any kind of penetration, which i warned her about and she must have disregarded, because every other obgyn I’ve had has never been as painful

I don't disagree that there are plenty of piece of shit obgyns around, either. I think they're a trade that is, in general, inclined to be more concerned about their patients than not, but its certainly not a guarantee.

I don't go to an OBGYN, because male, but reading this over dinner my gf raised the specter of an OBGYN betraying doctor/patient confidentiality to report said patient to law enforcement, citing "duty to report" law.

Sounds like a fine idea, but performing an abortion exposes you to criminal liability given the new law in Georgia, which would almost certainly cost you your medical license and ability to get malpractice coverage. Anti-abortion activists have gotten incredibly organized, and are quite capable of setting your practice up for a sting operation. Look at the lengths they've gone to to target Planned Parenthood.

I think there may be a loophole if the neighboring-state provider is very careful. I've noticed that it is "planning" to leave the state for an abortion that is considered conspiracy to murder, not actually having the abortion outside of Georgia. They can only regulate what happens in the state (the "conspiring") but not actions that take place out of state. An out-of-state provider would have to be really careful to never help women "plan" the her travels, not advertise in Georgia, and not even take appointments in advance.

She has a very valid point. Most patients don't get to see their regular doc enough to know them on a personal level, much less an OBGYN who is seen once every few years as needed. Or what if you've just moved? How would you know their views and intentions? Or the nurses doing intake and recording that could rat you out because of their beliefs.

You'd think that healthcare professionals would be at the forefront for advocating and providing appropriate, unbiased treatment based on the patient's wants and needs. Many become desensitized with their humanity fading into the background.

Georgia- "heartbeat bill" signed into law this week. Outlaws abortions after a "heartbeat" can be detected. ~6 weeks post conception... before most women even know they are pregnant.

Doctors who perform an abortion post 6 weeks can be tried for Murder, as can the woman getting the abortion. People driving someone to get the abortion can be charged with conspiracy to commit murder. Going out of state to have the procedure done can also result in murder charges. Any miscarriage can be investigated to see if it might have actually been an abortion.

I’ve kept out of the loop on the news for my mental health. But this really confuses me and distresses me living in a different red state.

When I was in Texas and was considering an abortion I was faced with the “72hr” shit and required the detailed ultrasound. I called PP at 4wks because if I was going to get one then I wanted it done immediately. They wouldn’t schedule me for an appointment until 6wks because they needed to perform an ultrasound and otherwise it would be “too early”. Consequently because of how republicans have ruined PP/clinics it meant the earliest appt I could even get was close to 9wks!!! I ended up keeping the pregnancy for different reasons and was lucky enough to be in a position to do so.... but for the women that can’t and don’t want to it leaves them no choice.

How the fuck does this law even make sense then? From my experience it would mean all abortions at any stage are off the table? So what the fuck?

I have a daughter and husband is Dutch. I love my country (or did?) but god damn do I feel like fleeing and leaving this mess behind to make sure my daughter has a better life. I just texted my husband about this who responded “LOL freedom”. :(

Honestly I think the women who voted Republican deserve this, along with the worst outcome possible as a result of the laws. I sincerely hope that their "pick me, I'm traditional and therefore more righteous " dance will be worth it.

I think I saw a documentary or two about this. I didn’t really watch them. I’m afraid what peering too far into their minds might do to a normal human being. I’m guessing most of those women agree that abortion is bad or have hit menopause so they just don’t care about the issue.

You are welcome in the Netherlands. If your daughter ever decides to have kids (or you have a "nakomertje"), Europe is also introducing several months of paid maternity and paternity leave. And abortion is your fucking right, no discussion. Oh, and our healthcare system works pretty well in general

This is some Ancient-Egyptian-brand stupid. They’re the only culture I know of which thought the heart...well, thought. Why are the lawmakers basing the status of fetuses as beings which deserve to live on whether they have heartbeats or not? What on earth is so important about the heart, in the contexts of identity, qualia, and ensoulment?

Y’know what else has a heartbeat? Frickin’ earthworms. Fruit flies. Shrimp have hearts; does anyone supporting the heartbeat bill think that shrimp have rich inner lives which deserve to be spared? Clearly the presence—or lack thereof—of a human brain isn’t a factor. Either to or in the lawmakers.

They don't care about heartbeats really. It's just something that they could tag on an anti-abortion bill that would make rubes say "Aww! how can you kill a little baby with a beating heart??? That's murder!".

This is not about saving lives- if they were interested in saving children's lives, then they would be advocating for easier/better adoption, better healthcare, better education, etc.... but they don't. This is about furthering their draconian agenda as quickly as possible because GA is trending more and more blue and will no longer be a sure-thing state for the GOP.

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I have lived in Georgia for 43 years. I love my state. Unfortunately, a massive part of the population is made up of idiots who will do ANYTHING that their preacher, Fox news, and/or God-approved GOP elected official tells them to do. The stereotype of "Dumb Southerner" exists for a reason. I cite a large chunk of my family as proof.

Do cockroaches have hearts? Maybe release a swarm of baby cockroaches at court and then protest the Mr. Rubles killing more than 5,000 innocent babies. And you can bet that the cockroaches will never disappear from the courthouse.

I'm sure this will be contested in the courts because it is very problematic. Here are some parts of the bill:

In addition to banning abortion after a heartbeat can be detected, the law's personhood provisions:

"Allow fetuses to be claimed as dependents for tax purposes.
Count fetuses as people in official population surveys, which would have implications for political representation.
Allow for women who perform their own abortions outside a formal medical setting to be charged with first-degree murder, which could carry a sentence of up to life in prison or the death penalty.

Under Georgia's law, it's unclear whether fetuses would be given their own separate trials or right to counsel if their mothers were charged with crimes, what would happen if a jury found a mother guilty but her fetus innocent, or whether all incarcerated pregnant women would have to be released from prison once the law goes into effect, since their fetuses were not charged with a crime."

Many people think this bill has a slim chance of actually going into effect. But we really are living in crazy times so I'm not going to count it out.

I mean, on its face it obviously flies directly in the face of Roe. It’s not a coincidence that States are passing all these ridiculous laws right after Kavanaugh potentially shifts the court on this issue. There’s no way some of that shit holds up though, even in a very conservative court.

I’m not a lawyer, but I’m curious what kind of legal problems would crop up with things like one state trying people for murder for things they do in other states that aren’t even crimes. Deciding in favor of these laws is going to cause lots of collateral damage to individual rights in other seemingly unrelated ways that a lot of these judges are also going to feel strongly about protecting.

Yes, overreach. But I don't think Georgia is trying to make getting an abortion in another state illegal. They are trying to make planning to have an abortion count as conspiracy for murder. So if you get an abortion out of state, they can back track, prove that you planned this "crime" while you were in Georgia, and there you go.

So the age of consent in GA is 16. The age of consent in New York is 17. So if someone in New York goes to GA to meet their 16 year old girlfriend there where it’s perfectly legal, New York can charge them with conspiring to be a pedophile because they planned the trip down to Georgia while in New York?

It seems like one state trying to rape another state’s laws. This shit ALWAYS comes from Red states and then once one thinks of it, more do it. (See what Carolina’s Republican legislature did to the powers of the newly elected in 2016 Democrat Governor).

I just wanted to write to confirm something for anyone unsure about the 6 weeks time. When I got pregnant with my daughter, I was pretty sure I was pregnant the day after I conceived. HOWEVER, I took test after test, including 3 at drs offices in the next 3 months. Only two of all the tests I took came up positive and I was already 9-10 weeks along by that time. Even though I suspected and I was pretty sure I was pregnant, no test could confirm it (including my dr's office) because of the following: I still got my period for the first 3 months, and my hormone levels were not high enough to be detected until month 3. This means someone would have to do an internal ultrasound to confirm you're pregnant (and even these don't help if it's too early) and by that point, according to this bill, it would be too late. This bill is insane and disgusting. I cannot imagine the horror any woman forced to go through with such a life-altering and potentially lethal process as this bill will cause. I'm horrified and nauseated.

I will reiterate what I had suggested when I first heard of this bill: I'm not suggesting women of Georgia protect themselves by sending their used sanitary products to the politicians responsible for this bill. Those products can be tested for miscarriages and protect the women of Georgia, but sending them en mass would be disgusting and hold up the mail services (and potentially be a criminal action). However, I would never suggest women should do such a thing.

Maybe photos of used sanitary products could be emailed/tweeted/texted in? "Hey senator, just my monthly check-in to demonstrate that I am having my period, thus am not pregnant and at risk of harming a fetus. Photos of this today's used tampons below!"

The "great" thing about this is that I knew I was pregnant at about 3-4 weeks, but it took my doctors about 3 weeks to schedule me an appointment to confirm. Even then it was just a consultation & peeing on a stick essentially, they asked if I was going to consider an abortion since I am high risk but to schedule it would have been even more weeks out. Definitely unable to be done within 6 weeks. And my doctors office is a nicer one (been to some crappy ones trying to find an ob I could stand) with about 7 doctors in it. Luckily I wasn't looking for an abortion as I chose to only have sex when I was ready & able to take care of a child should it happen, but I can't imagine many women who want an abortion to be able to actually get one within 6 weeks.

Exact same. We'd been trying for months so I knew my cycle down to the day, when my period hadn't come that morning I didn't even bother peeing on a stick because I knew. Called my doc who was like "Well the blood test is just as accurate as modern pee tests..." They wouldn't schedule me for a vaginal ultrasound until I was at 9 weeks because it's otherwise pointless that early.

I hadn't been trying, I was actually told I it would be hard for me to get pregnant but apparently going off my birth control for two weeks (wanting to change from the pill to nexplanon at the beginning of the year a month later) made me fertile enough to get pregnant. Because of medical problems I made the appointment because I thought I was either pregnant or had cancer that was messing with my hormones & making my breasts hurt like hell, presenting as a false pregnancy. I think me saying I thought it might be cancer was the only reason they let me in at 7 weeks and did a vaginal ultrasound.

Now you know, if you ever get pregnant again tell them youre afraid it's cancer & maybe they'll give you an ultrasound early. Life hacks.

Holy fucking shit. I had no idea it was this bad. I just heard about this yesterday and thought it just prevented doctors from performing abortions in Georgia. I think Georgians need to get together and protest the shit out of this.

Minor correction- it isn't six weeks post conception. It's when a woman is six weeks pregnant. Pregnancy is counted from the first day of your last menstrual period- you don't actually conceive until (on average) 2-3 weeks after that, sometimes even longer. It's an important distinction to make, because I see a lot of people debating the "before most women know they're pregnant" claim without understanding this. My cycles are five weeks long, so by the time my period was a week late, I'd already be six weeks pregnant.

Well, there are. It's a really problematic way to make those calculations and wildly inaccurate. It's still the most commonly used, especially that early in pregnancy shortly after the positive test. I told my doctor the date I concieved my last child because I was meticulously tracking with ovulation tests, etc., and they still used the date of my last period until I had my first ultrasound, which confirmed I had been correct. At that point they adjusted the date- but I didn't have my first ultrasound until I was 9 weeks pregnant by their calculation, 8 weeks by mine. They don't schedule ultrasounds before 6 weeks for the overwhelming majority of people because there is no guarantee you can see anything yet. So 99% of the time, if a doctor is confirming your pregnancy at six weeks (or before), they will use a urine or blood test to confirm you are indeed pregnant and use the date of your LMP to estimate how far along you are. By the time you are able to get a more accurate estimation, it will be too late under this law. Which is yet another problem with it- a person could be deemed too far along to have an abortion, then find out weeks later once they actually are too far along that they could have had one at that point.

I'm on the upper end of number of days for long cycles, and usually skip one or two periods a year. The last time I skipped, if something had happened and I got pregnant, I would have been a month pregnant the day of conception from a legal stance.

There should be an easy fix for this. Copy-paste happens a ton in hospitals. Just switch mother and fetus and then state that since the mother was listed as dead on the paper so therefore the fetus was unsavable and so you kept it from suffering.

What is even more terrifying is that this isn’t “~6 weeks post conception”. A so-called heartbeat can be seen between 5-6 weeks gestational age.

Health care providers use the first day of the last period (LMP) as the starting point to count gestation. Most people ovulate between 2-3 weeks after their LMP, meaning the day they conceive or get pregnant is retroactively counted as 2-3 weeks gestation.

Which means ~6 weeks gestational age is equal to about 3-4 weeks post-conception. Or just days after realizing your period is late. Meaning the day you find out you are pregnant could already be too late.

If you're on the side of "let's reduce abortion with ethical prevention methods like ensuring everyone has sexual education and affordable/accessible birth control", then we're on the same side, and I consider myself pro-choice.

Same here. Also recognizing while I would never get one that's a personal thing and shouldn't impact other people's legal ability to control their own body. I've gone from "I see their point" to straight up rage over how much hatred they have for women. Fetuses have more rights than actual human beings to these folks. I can't be forced to donate bone marrow to save a life, but my uterus is fair game because "whores" or some bullshit.

its the result of the current political climate where extremism gets all of the attention and votes and reasonable candidates have a hard time getting elected. That's how you end up with morons like Trump and hardcore anti-everything bigots like Pence in office. In Georgia's case, our Governor ran a campaign appealing to the far right mentality of "mericuh, guns, and gawd" and it got him elected. Legislation like this is the result.

Georgia is basically doing a back-door ban on abortion by not allowing a fetus to be terminated past 6 weeks, and making it so if you go out of state to get it done, you can still be punished for it.
edit: i also think if you miscarry you have to be interviewed so you’re cleared of “intentional miscarriage”

I got a bit careful calling things outright Nazi or fascist, even if I think they are, because a lot of people dismiss the thought because "lol, godwins law" or something and start to distract from the actual topic.

There was a popular post on a subreddit just a few days ago where the author had 1488 in his username, I can't remember what the name was exactly but it also said something about jewish people. People called him out and all of his alt right butt clowns came to the rescue, insisting that 1488 was totally not referring to anything racist or related to Hitler. "Oh you people will always jump straight to calling us Nazis!" Yeah because you fucking are.

When this becomes law you(all Georgians) should report all your elected officials (male and female) for suspected abortions / conspiracy to commit abortions / conspiracy to aid in abortions. Work your way down and up the pulpit too.

If a normal part of human biology is suspect then they all need to be investigated.

I suppose if you're looking for an upside there's this. And since climate change isn't real they will stay put like a frog in water slowly being brought to boil. Now we just need a way to reverse the change after they are gone.

I am too - I’m a lady living in Alaska, who has had to look in to both sexual assault and abortions. Fortunately I miscarried before I had to make any difficult decisions, but my doctor was incredibly supportive and absolutely willing.

Yes but there are lots of normal men who like to have sex with women. If women are like "nope sorry" to them, maybe they will get off their arses and do something. It's idealistic and seems like more of a cool thought experiment, but I think the idea is that a form of protest like this is aimed at your average Joe, so it directly becomes their problem as well, not at idiot dinosaurs.

The problem is that men like yourself are still capable of impregnating women. There are vasectomy babies and tubal ligation babies and birth control babies. Under the new law, a woman can basically only afford the have intercourse if she is certain she wants to be a mother. So I guess it's ok to have sex with men if the woman wants to conceive.

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By the way, I'm a woman who only likes heterosexual intercourse. But I wouldn't have it in Georgia, because condoms and birth control have a failure rate, and I'm not ready to be a mom.

I don't consider it a protest. I consider it self-defense. If abortion is outlawed, women can only afford heterosexual intercourse if they are ready to become moms. I don't see how that's hard to understand.

I live in Texas. If Texas outlaws abortion, I'll have to stop having sex. I'm in no position to be a mother.

It isn't realistic, but if the law comes into effect and isn't shut down by the SCOTUS, it would mean that anyone who gets pregnant could be held criminally liable for miscarrying. No woman with an intact reproductive system participating in sex with men would be safe. Even those who want children would be at risk.

Heterosexual abstinence would then be the only way to protect oneself from criminal liability rather than a form of protest.

I'm not insane at all. If having sex with a man could possibly stick a woman pregnancy, childbirth, and a lifetime of parenting that she doesn't want, then refusing intercourse is the only logical solution. Aren't conservatives always telling women to "keep your legs closed"?

I'm going to TMI you guys, but give you a valid hypothetical that could potentially happen to me as I have had plenty of false positives (otherwise known as chemical pregnancies)

Here's the TMI: my cycle lasts as long as 68 days and averages around 52...

Here's some biology that lawmakers likely do not know: you know what causes false positives? High LH levels which has the same protein structure as HCG (the pregnancy hormone). Do you know what causes high LH levels? Ovulation. More specifically, your body telling your ovaries to begin forming follicles that grow eggs.

Here's my incredibly likely hypothetical: Let's say I go to the doctor for the flu. Their first question to a woman is this, "when was your last period". In my case, I would say something like, "32 days ago but my cycle is naturally long. I haven't had sex, I'm not pregnant." You know what their next step is? A pregnancy test, despite my assertion that I haven't had sex and am not pregnant, that I'm just here at the doctor because I have the flu. So in this case, around 32 days, my LH levels would likely be at their peak. I would possibly return a false positive strip pregnancy test. This would be added to my medical record. I then show up to another doctor's visit for something miscellaneous. They see previously I tested positive on a strip test, and now I'm not pregnant. This doctor could report this legally under the bill, completely forgoing my right to medical privacy, and my medical records would be subpoenaed. Those records would then be used to accuse me of MURDER. MUR. DER.

One more time for the old white men in the back MUR. DER.

I am a Georgia resident. This is terrifying. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

This is so fucking terrifying. This is likely a thing in Pakistan, my shithole country, and i hate to say it but lying is your best friend right now.

I've lied and said I'm married to get birth control and ECP. I lie upon convenience and become married and unmarried at will (no one really checks), and while i know it's not healthy and will likely screw me in the long run, I don't trust doctors with my privacy.

My niece is unfortunately moving back shortly. She's super glad she has had her tubes tied already. I cannot imagine being terrified of your doctor in this manner. Here in California go to the pharmacy and your bcp is free without a doctor visit. Once girls start menstruation parents are unable to converse with the doctor about their reproduction. It's all up to the ladies. Fat cry from when I had to sign a form swearing I was an unmarried woman to have my tubes tied! ( husband's at that time had final say in the matter!)

I had to fight to get an IUD about 10 years ago in my early 20s. The doctor did invasive testing for stds with what I thought was the premise of getting an IUD when I came up clean. I was then called and told that no one in the practice felt comfortable performing the procedure because I didn't have children. This was a women's clinic in an extremely liberal town, I was unbelievably pissed. Went to a different doctor and he didn't even bat an eye and I got my IUD. It's definitely gotten better over time in alot of ways, but laws like this are really scary to see in the headlines.

Honestly I still would be scared of that slim slim chance of an ectopic pregnancy either with IUD or full sterilization. Like how would a Georgia treat that? Would my choices be prison or certain death?

I have a question about these new laws, particularly the one in Georgia. I've gotten pregnant twice while using an IUD (yes, really). I miscarried one of those pregnancies fairly early, possibly because I had the IUD. I didn't discover I was pregnant until I started miscarrying. It seems like under the Georgia law, I could have been charged with murder because I was using a device that caused a miscarriage. Am I understanding this right?

I’m a newly licensed physician about to begin residency in the state of Georgia.

Doctors and healthcare professionals cannot reveal your healthcare information to anyone without your consent. This is the basis of HIPPA. We are obligated by LAW to not disclose patient information. Your healthcare information is extremely private, and every healthcare worker I know works hard to keep you safe and healthy. (I mean, there are some bad seeds in every field but, for the most part, we care deeply for our patients.)

If the government of Georgia starts demanding healthcare information be mandatorily released to them, then we officially live in a totalitarian state. It breaks a shit ton of laws regarding how our healthcare system works to protect your privacy, and I highly doubt it will happen.

Anti-doctor retoric is not helpful to this conversation. We love you. We care about you. We want to work with you to keep you healthy.

(Don’t get me wrong, this law has me seething. It’s absolute and total bullshit. It threatens women and creates a ton of horrible potential health crises by making it nearly impossible to obtain safe and legal abortion. Almost every physician I have spoken to is furious about it.)

I get that you are a great doctor and I agree most are but to tell op to blindly trust when you yourself are saying “almost every physician I have spoken to is furious about it.” is unfair.
It would suck to be op if she happens to get one who isn’t furious about it. Yeah hippa is there but that hasn’t stopped tomfoolery from happening to people in other cases.

It's not anti doctor rhetoric, it's anti- the policies that reduce women's bodily autonomy, and doctors are embroiled in that.

This looks like a very fat thin end of the wedge. What if it becomes law that mandatory reporting of intent to harm includes seeking an abortion? Then you, no matter how kind you are, would be required to report any woman who comes to see you asking about termination. I'd lie to you as well.

Apologies. I simply meant that OP would be better to direct anger at the lawmakers than at doctors. My perspective is that of a young doctor, and I truly do see so much compassion in my colleagues. (my friends and I coming out of school are In our late 20s and early 30s mostly). My friends care. They care about issues like this, and they care about patient rights, including privacy.

Additionally, I would never work in a place that required me to mandatorily report such nonsense. I don’t imagine many doctors would want to work in an environment where their actions caused them to regularly send their patients off to lawsuits and potential criminal punishment.

If you wish to lie to your doctor about your health, it’s obviously a personal choice. No one can stop you from doing so.

Yeah, sure, laws need to change, but you're talking about broad structural changes. People need to do things to protect themselves immediately. They literally don't have time to wait around for laws to change.

If you slice off your finger you're not going to wait around for a surgeon to sew it back on, you have to stop the bleeding in the mean time.

I finally thought of a solution to this atrocious law! All undocumented women who want kids need to get pregnant and flock there, then all their fetuses would be considered citizens, and then we would find out just how much Georgia values "life".
And as many women as possible should join your protest cause its fucking genius.

One thing I'm thinking of is that I don't think women will be last. After women lose the basic human right to bodily autonomy, it will be that much easier for the state to decide that they can force low-status women or men to donate blood, kidneys, marrow, etc.

Scary scary scary scary wtf wtf wtf wtf is wrong with the world rn. I knew it was happening, didn't cross my mind my feelings when hearing personally from women who live there; here's one. On one hand my first instinct is to pretty much yell "get out" while on the other hand; how the hell are we going to let an entire state of America get away with this shit? What would all women moving from the state look like/accomplish anyway? What the hell is the best route to take here? I'm in Canada by the way for context.

I am not in GA, but just thinking of some of the less obvious negative effects this law could have. Like I can see many pregnant women waiting til they are out of the first trimester (by their own estimation) or even later before seeking prenatal care, out of fear of getting in trouble if they miscarry after a doctor has confirmed pregnancy. This could lead to many more deaths by ruptured ectopic pregnancies, things like that....

The people making these laws are idiots. People should have no right to say what someone has the right to do with themselves unless they've experienced what would happen first hand. As a teenager who's been through all the sex ed classes, I shouldn't be scared of doing it when I'm an adult.

I'm with you! Until all the men & women who deny a women's right to choose actually financially support pregnant women & then adopt & raise ALL the unwanted babies with love & compassion & until they finish college, their ignorant & half-formed knee-jerk beliefs will always be nothing more than lip-service. I have yet to hear of any of them walking the walk & stepping up to make any difference at all other than as pious controlling shamers.

What happened to the separation of church and state? Ugh. My lady bits hurt for every woman in the state of Georgia. This is absurd and I feel so powerless. I live in PA. So I mean if anybody is in a pickle, schedule here, I’ve got a spare bedroom with fresh sheets and you can stay as long as you need to to heal. It’s all I’ve got to offer.

Oh and a cute black lab that will cuddle you and spoon you to death while you recuperating (spoken from experience)

Most of these anti-abortion fuckknuckles are religious as the day as long and using god/religion/church as foundation for the bills and laws being presented and passed. And need i mention Georgia is in the Bible Belt so I mean that there speaks for it self; you can’t buy certain things on Sundays (in certain counties) because it’s a sabbath (never mind our Jewish friends who observe theirs on Saturday, but it’s a Baptist ran state)? If you’d like to point out where exactly the separation lies in Georgia I’m open to adjusting my opinion and furthering education but as a Newnan county Georgia native, it’s a very VERY blurry and often crossed line and as a woman I’m more often than not, I’m seeing religious basis for all of these decisions.

Religion informs people's beliefs and people vote for candidates who share their beliefs. Separation of church and state as a concept has nothing to to with preventing laws being drafted that have some or all of their philosophical foundation in religious belief, it is in fact to prevent the State form exerting power and authority over matters of religion and the institution of the church from having authority over or within the State. It was said by Thomas Jefferson in a time where that was a serious problem.

In my country, the UK, we do not have separation of church and state. The head of state (the Queen) is also the head of the Church of England, and within the House of Lords (like the Senate but holds the aristocracy and not elected members like in the US) has positions eternally granted to bishops of the Church who vote on laws the same as other members of the political establishment.

So my point is not that abortion is not a debate in part fuelled by religious belief (it is), it's that the doctrine of separation of church and state is not violated in this instance

I’m commenting so that you know I’ve read up on the experiment and am not simply downvoting to join a trend (as can happen).

Of course there are going to be doctors who agree with the legislation and the sentiment behind it (with which I WHOLEHEARTEDLY disagree with) but there are also a huge amount of doctors who do not agree.

Years ago, my cousin got pregnant in a state that did not allow abortions unless there was a health risk to either the mother or the foetus. She had just finished university, and started an awesome new job. The guy she got pregnant with was an old friend, they used a condom, but it came off when he was pulling out post-coitus. She didn’t find out until 5 weeks later, when she pre-emptively took a pregnancy test. She spoke to me, her mother, our aunts, and then our equivalent of a family planning clinic hotline. I went with her to see a doctor. It was a male doctor and she was terrified but that was the only doctor who had a consultation free that afternoon.

We spent about 45 minutes talking to the doctor (her and him talking 90% of the time, me just there to say yes, I support her with whatever decision she makes) and in the end he gave her the choice. She got the certificate to get the procedure done if she wanted. We spent more time discussing at home, she agonised over the decision, but had the procedure done.

She is a boss bitch. A couple of years later, she got me a job where she worked. She has always been switched on. I don’t think I would be where I am today without her. Today she has a couple of kids, and I’m the godmother to the first of her beautiful babies.

My point is, there is more going on behind the scenes than anyone can appreciate or pass judgement on, unless you’ve been in their shoes

I don’t mean to make men evil. I love men and have two amazing sons. White men have had the power in this country (US) and they don’t want to let go. Black men gained their right to vote before women. There is a tremendous difference between men’s and women’s pay, that is not justified by performance. Sexual harassment is prolific- and that’s about power over.

I wonder if 1) men don’t want to lose their power and all that comes along with it; and 2) men are ultimately afraid of women’s power.

Men having the authority to decide what happens to women’s bodies if they are pregnant is an example of how men try to maintain their power.

Why is everyone mentioning miscarriage? I read this, " The law even specifically notes that procedures to treat a “spontaneous abortion,” meaning a miscarriage or stillbirth, are not punishable under the law.". It also states only Doctors can be punished.

It’s not hard to imagine a miscarriage being investigated as an illegal abortion... it already happens and even just questioning under suspicion during a traumatic time would be extremely upsetting, but now imagine an investigator pulling text records and seeing normal signs of doubt or fear about a pregnancy as being motive and bringing a case for murder... how do you prove that it wasn’t?

Here is a case of someone who fell down her stairs, went to the doctor to make sure nothing had happened, and casually mentioned fears about raising a third child despite her marriage falling apart. That potential “motive” was enough to get her reported, arrested, and charged for attempted feticide...

If you are looking, someone on twitter put out a blast of links to similar cases, I remember one including a mother charged after declining a c-section and having one of her twins come out stillborn.

Why be so passive aggressive with the doctor? They didn't cause the BS law. The new law comes between you and your doctor. Why not just tell them why you're withholding info. They'll likely agree with you! And my condolences for having to be a female in GA.

I'm not going to make an appointment just to try and prove a point. I only go the the doctor when there is something wrong, but most of the time they ask you menstruation questions when it has nothing to do with the actual problem.

So if you cut off your finger, you will need surgery and for that you will need anesthesia and for that we need to ask if you are pregnant. Stop making us doctors the enemy please :) Most of us roll our eyes at senators who think they even know what constitutes an actual functioning heartbeat.

Nobodys making doctors the enemies, but the law is threatening the security of patient confidentiality. Doctors are also disadvantaged by a law that makes honesty about reproductive status potentially dangerous to the patients own health and freedom.

Rolled eyes are appreciated but not sufficient alone—for doctors to do their job, it has to be in their patients best interest to be 100% honest. If a law stands in the way of this, it must be overturned.

I am not really sure and this is through my own miseducation but how's that law going to override HIPAA?? I would be rightfully fired if i released personal info. The portion that they were saying we(physicians) would serve time in jail for performing an abortion (not within the realm of my specialty) is absolutely insane.

A court can order you to release medical information as part of a court order during a criminal investigation. Ignoring Georgia's new law for a moment, a court could order you to release or testify about the medical records of a child abuse victim during a criminal trial, for example. You would not be violating HIPAA by following a court order. Your employer (unless you're self employed) would probably appoint you a lawyer to help you through the process.

You could refuse to testify in the case of a woman being charged for having an abortion, but you might find yourself jailed indefinitely.

I see. I have actually had to respond to these but it was info regarding injuries sustained during a crime or during a trauma (peds vs motor) etc.

I think what I find offensive, as a woman and as a surgeon, is that these lawmakers are inserting themselves into my.....i don't know how to phrase it....my "dominion" ....alot of us pride ourselves on the fact that we provide a safe environment for any patient that comes from any walk of life to express what is going on physically/emotionally and why.....so that we can find a diagnosis, rx, or tools to get you better.

I definitely agree!! It’s a terrible situation to be in. Hopefully we can work to prevent these harmful invasions into medicine and womens’ lives, so doctors can be given the trust they deserve and nobody can be endangered by doing so.

There’s precedent in other countries for doctors to be legally charged with investigating miscarriages for ‘wrongdoing’ (despite this not being medically discernible in most cases) or reporting pregnancies to the state. Failure to comply could result in a charge for them (aiding and abetting murder) and being stripped of medical licensure.

This also means telling doctors about things now could be used against women later, should the law change.

It’s pretty dystopian tbh, but you can’t really call it paranoia if it’s happened before and in other countries.

and for that you will need anesthesia and for that we need to ask if you are pregnant.

And when the patient answers "I don't know" (which is pretty much true anyway if the patient is sexually active and not post-menopausal) no doubt you'd give them a pregnancy test if it's important to know for sure.

You also say in another post that you will break the law for your patients. That may be true for you, but one can't assume that. That's part of why Savita Halappanavar died in Ireland.

It is not OP who is making doctors the enemy, it is the Georgia legislature.

We have to get the pregnancy test regardless of "yes, no or i don't know"
I haven't heard of Savita's case but unfortunately it is more common that one thinks.
I am looking forward to seeing GA leg against us. A lot of us are politically involved and are gearing up to fighting this.

Who knew having a small muscular organ (did you know the uterus is the strongest muscle in the human body?) is so threatening!

I know doctors aren't the enemy and I know the questions asked for our charts is just part of the paperwork process. And I'm all for science, medicine, vaccines and getting my finger put back on haha. But even if most of you roll your eyes at these crazy laws, there is always the chance of 1 doctor being a complete asshat and reporting you. You should have seen the look on my doctors face when I flat out asked how I could get an abortion if the genetic screenings came back bad. I luckily had a healthy baby and my only complication was a nasty high fever from a kidney infection (cheap catheters don't drain and back that piss up). Most of these laws are scare tactics, but no woman wants to be on the receiving end of the punishment. I think I have the right to feel a little nervous sharing my reproductive history even to a healthcare professional.

so i have never heard of any of my colleagues reporting something like this. i am not saying you are wrong but do you know who we would report to? and what the report would actually say? unfortunately, besides operating a lot of my job is "paperwork" (more like computer work.....and we get a massive amount of training to report child abuse or elderly abuse etc but not this.

i have to say .....as a profession we are massively disappointed in the system. some of the things that are said in congress are medically inaccurate and these are the same people making laws.....its ridiculous (and yes there are old school physicians that have opinions that modern science has proved that are categorically wrong) but most of us are only interested in the welfare of our patients that is it. If i have to break the law to do that, then so be it. I protect that patient first end of story.

I guess they would have to pass a new law to make you a mandated reporter of potential aborters. Making watchlists of anyone that gets a life altering fetal diagnosis, teenagers with an sti, someone with multiple sex partners, or any pregnant lady delaying appointments for a "vacation". Don't think that will happen anytime soon at least. I'm glad you would fight for your patients.